Method for playing digital contents protected with a drm (digital rights management) scheme and corresponding system

ABSTRACT

The method and system are for playing digital contents protected by a DRM scheme, wherein the digital contents are stored in a server and downloaded or streamed to a user device. The approach includes executing a DRM application inside the user device implementing a proxy between the server and a native player of the user device, and connecting the DRM proxy application to the server, selecting a digital content to be downloaded and retrieving a corresponding remote playlist. Also, the approach includes transforming the remote playlist into a local playlist having a format readable from the native player and executing a plurality of local packets of the local playlist inside the native player.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to a method and a corresponding system forplaying digital contents protected with a DRM scheme, the digitalcontents being stored in a server provider and downloaded in a userdevice to be decrypted and played. More particularly, the inventionrelates to a method and system of the type described above wherein theDRM scheme requires that the digital contents are played by a specificplayer of the user device.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

Known approaches for protecting digital contents with DRM (Digitalrights management) prevent unauthorized redistribution and restrict theways a user can copy purchased content, thus limiting the piracy ofcommercially marketed digital material, which recently increasedespecially through the widespread use of peer-to-peer file exchangeprograms.

A known approach for protecting digital contents may be implemented byembedding a code in the digital content which prevents its copy to anunauthorized user device. Further protections may be provided, forexample, by specifying a time period in which the content can beaccessed or limiting the number of devices whereon the content can beinstalled or read. More particularly, a protected digital content and acode is transmitted from a client to a device of a user which purchasesthe content. The digital content is stored in the client or retrievedfrom the client in streaming from a network. When the user devicereceives the digital content in protected format, it decrypts such withthe code.

A limitation of the above cited approach is that the client or contentprovided is responsible not only to deliver the digital content inprotected format but also to implement the DRM, generating the code forthe user device and storing it. In other words, the approach has anotable impact on the client. Moreover, this approach has a limitationof security because the code enabling the reading of the protecteddigital content is transmitted to the user device and is at leastavailable to the user; in other words, the code is not consumed ordestroyed after reading the protecting digital content in the userdevice and it remains available for the user.

It may be desired to reduce the impact of protecting digital contents onthe client or content provider and to enforce the security of the DRM sothat the code enabling the user device to read the digital contentprovider is not easily available at the user device side, thusovercoming the limitations of current approaches.

Different types of content services and common DRM problems in each typeare discussed below.

In a rental service, the consumer purchases the right to use content fora fixed period of time. In a rental service like video on demand (VOD),the content lifetime is usually short (e.g. 24 hours) and the content isviewed on a single device. This may be the simplest type of service toimplement in a consumer-friendly way.

In a subscription rental service, the consumer can access a substantiallibrary of content. In a streaming video subscription service, forexample, a subscriber may pay a monthly fee to access a variety ofmovies or TV programs. In a subscription rental service, consumers getaccess to content for a longer period of time so issues like theportability of the content (moving content between devices or accessingit multiple times on different devices), device upgrades and updates tothe DRM technology may be considered. New licenses may be issued tosubscribers to allow access for the next subscription period. Thisprocess should be as seamless as possible and not cause any disruptionin accessing subscription content.

In a “purchase to own” model, the consumer purchases the right toconsume the content for as long as desired. A common requirement in thistype of service is the ability to backup content and licenses in case adevice is damaged, stolen or upgraded. Upgrades of the DRM technologymay also need to be handled so that new content can be purchased afterthe upgrade but previously purchased content can still be used.Consumers will often expect to access the content on multiple devices.

Some DRM content services only deliver content to one type of device.More commonly content distributors want to deliver content to a range ofdifferent devices, e.g. Android phones and iPhones. Multipleimplementations of the same DRM technology are required for differentdevices and operating systems. The DRM client may be integrated with amedia player, download manager, file system and other components on thedevice. As a result DRM clients are often installed on the device duringmanufacture or provisioning. A Microsoft Playready DRM client forexample, may not be available on all the devices used by the contentservice's target consumers.

Also, many DRM technologies bind licenses to a particular device. Thismeans that a new license must be issued to each device on which theconsumer wants to play the content and it may be necessary to track thedevices owned by a particular consumer.

Content can be downloaded or streamed. Streaming content is often onlystored on the server side and not on the client device. This has theadvantage that device upgrades or updates of the DRM technology are lessproblematic since older DRM content does not have to be ported to thenew device or DRM version.

Examples of content services and the typical DRM problems associatedwith them are set forth below.

Video on demand includes a service type involving rental, e.g. 24-houraccess to films and TV programs. Content delivery involves download orstreaming, and devices include PCs or connected TVs. This type ofservice has few DRM usability issues as long as DRM clients areavailable for all target device types.

“Unlimited” video subscription service includes a service type involvingsubscription rental and streaming content delivery. Devices include PCs,connected TVs, tablets and mobile phones. Making DRM clients availablefor all target device types may require additional development.Subscription renewal should be as transparent as possible and the usershould not encounter any interruptions in content access. Features likelicense predelivery and silent license delivery facilitate “invisible”subscription renewal.

Video download to own is a purchase-to-own service type with contentdelivery that is downloaded. Devices include PCs, connected TVs, tabletsand mobile phones. Content and licenses should be backed up on theserver-side to allow users to move them when devices are lost orupgraded. When updating the DRM technology, older content must still beplayable. In major upgrades, a new version of previously purchasedcontent may need to be delivered to subscribers.

As known, a method for playing digital contents protected by a DRMscheme provides that a user device plays the contents downloaded from aserver provider only if a license is acquired and used to decrypt thecontent. The DRM (Digital Right Management) scheme may also require thatthe digital content is played with a specific player which is enabled todecrypt the digital contents download or received in streaming from theserver. Also the streaming format from the server provider may beprovided by the DRM scheme.

In this respect, the user device may store a native player which isdifferent from the specific player requested by the DRM scheme. The termnative player is referred to a player stored by a manufacturer of theuser device together with the operating system; the native player may befaster than a “non-native” player, since it is more integrated with theoperating system. For instance, the native player may use an acceleratorof the operating system for improving the performance of rendering amovie.

Thus, if the specific player requested by the DRM scheme is not thenative player of the user device, the performance of the digital contentreproduction may be reduced.

In this respect, digital contents downloaded or streamed with the DRMPlayReady scheme of Microsoft, cannot be read and decrypted from thenative player of an iPhone mobile user device, i.e. from Quick TimePlayer. In this case, a specific and non-native player must bedownloaded into the iPhone mobile for decrypting and playing suchcontents. The non-native player inside the iPhone may perform less thanthe Quick Time Player, due to a slower communication with the operatingsystem of the user device, i.e. iOS.

So a technical problem that may need to be addressed is how to playdigital content protected with a DRM scheme without downloading aspecific player, such specific player being however required by the DRMscheme to decrypt and play the digital content which is downloaded orstreamed from the server provider. Another technical problem is how toprovide a method for securely playing digital contents protected by aDRM scheme with a secure and improved performance and flexibility (e.g.without leaking out decryption keys and contents), especially for whatconcerns the phases for decrypting and playing the digital contents inthe user device, thus overcoming the limitation which currently affectsthe prior art method.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

The approach at the base of the present invention is to store anapplication inside a user device which translates the digital contentsprotected with a predetermined DRM scheme into a digital format which isreadable by a native player of the user device. The application, alsoindicated as DRM proxy application, handles decryption, licenseacquisition and rights management, through a DRM server which isconnected via a network to the user device. The application runs as alocal web server on the user device, for example on an iPhone userdevice, and communicates with the native player of the user device.

According to an embodiment of the invention, the DRM applicationsupports Apple HTTP streaming and also Microsoft Smooth Streaming from aremote server, thus enabling the native player to play digital contentsmanaged according to different DRM streaming protocols. Advantageously,the performance of the digital content execution is increased becausethe native player is specifically designed to communicate with the userdevice operating system and the DRM proxy application.

According to the approach reported above, the technical problem isaddressed by a method for playing digital contents protected by a DRMscheme, wherein the digital contents are stored in a server provider andstreamed to a user device for playing, the method including: executing aDRM application inside the user device, the application interfacing theserver and a native player of the user device; connecting the DRMapplication to the server, selecting a digital content to be downloadedand retrieving a corresponding remote playlist; transforming the remoteplaylist in a local playlist having a format readable from the nativeplayer and playing a plurality of local packets of the local playlistinside the native player. The step of playing the local playlistincluding, for each packet: requesting a corresponding remote packetfrom the DRM application to said server; returning the remote packet tothe DRM application; acquiring a license to decrypt the remote packet;and decrypting the remote packet in the DRM application and returningthe decrypted packet to the native player as a local packet to bedisplayed.

Advantageously, the native player of the user device is used to play thecontent even if the DRM scheme requires a different and specific player;the communication between the native player and the operating system ofthe user device is faster than a communication between such operatingsystem and a specific and non-native player. In fact, the native playermay use the accelerator provided by the operating system of the userdevice for rendering the digital contents.

In an embodiment of the invention, the user device is an iPhone and theDRM scheme is Apple HTTP Streaming or Microsoft Smooth Streaming withcontents downloaded or streamed from a remote server. Preferably,according to this embodiment, the native player is Quick time Player.The method for playing contents further supports streaming from atelevision content provider like HBO. Thus, a native player of a userdevice, for example the native player of iPad, iPhone or Android, may beused to directly play movie streamed from HBO.

According to an aspect of the invention, the step of acquiring thelicense comprises connecting the DRM proxy application to a DRM serverand sending an URL included in the encrypted digital contents forretrieving the license. Advantageously, the license request is embeddedin the encrypted digital contents.

Preferably the license request is executed before activating the nativeplayer and which is activated only if the license is acquired from theDRM server. Advantageously, according to this aspect of the invention,if a license is not acquired, no time is spent for activating the nativeplayer.

According to an embodiment of the invention, all the remote packets ofthe remote playlist are associated to a same license and the step ofacquiring is executed only once, preferably for the first remote packetof the remote playlist.

In another embodiment, the remote playlist includes only one remotepacket as a full file corresponding to the entire digital content;according to this embodiment, the DRM proxy application divide theremote packet in a plurality of local packets which are separatelyexecuted by the native player.

The method supports a DRM scheme based on Microsoft Smooth Streaming, inthis case, the step of retrieving a corresponding remote playlistincludes retrieving a SmoothStreaming playlist and Manifest files. TheDRM proxy may be configured to operate at a bit rate among the bit ratesavailable in the remote playlist.

Further advantages and features according to the present invention willbe apparent from the description given here below.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating components of a system and phasesof the method according to the present invention;

FIG. 2 is a block diagram illustrating components of a system and phasesof the method according to another embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram schematically representing a system and methodaccording to an embodiment of the invention.

FIG. 4 is a schematic diagram illustrating a proxy server in the userdevice operating with a multimedia player, and the multimedia serveraccording to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 5 is a communication timing diagram schematically illustrating amethod for playing digital contents protected with a DRM scheme,according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 6 is a communication timing diagram schematically illustrating amethod for playing digital contents protected with a DRM scheme,according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 7 is a communication timing diagram schematically illustrating amethod for playing digital contents protected with a DRM scheme,according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 8 is a schematic diagram illustrating an integration of an agentimplementing a DRM proxy and the other application of the user deviceplaying digital contents protected by a DRM scheme, according to anembodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 9 is a schematic diagram illustrating an exemplary communicationflow when special protocol, for instance the Apple HTTP Streamingprotocol, is used between the proxy server and the multimedia serveraccording to an aspect of the invention.

FIG. 10 is a schematic diagram illustrating some security detailsadopted between the user device and the multimedia server according toan aspect of the invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS

The present invention will now be described more fully hereinafter withreference to the accompanying drawings in which preferred embodiments ofthe invention are shown. This invention may, however, be embodied inmany different forms and should not be construed as limited to theembodiments set forth herein. Rather, these embodiments are provided sothat this disclosure will be thorough and complete, and will fullyconvey the scope of the invention to those skilled in the art. Likenumbers refer to like elements throughout. The dimensions of layers andregions may be exaggerated in the figures for greater clarity.

With reference to FIGS. 1 and 2, it is schematically represented asystem and method for protecting digital contents with DRM according tothe present invention, wherein a client site 2 or a content provider isin communication with a user device 3 for transmitting digital contentsin a protected format. Typically, the client site 2 stores the digitalcontent (e.g. FIG. 1) or retrieves such in a streaming format from anetwork (FIG. 2).

By way of example, the user device 3 may be a cellular device that iscapable of sending and receiving calls, messages, emails and data via awireless (i.e., cellular) communications network. However, other typesof wireless devices (and networks), such as wireless local area network(WLAN) devices, may also be used. Moreover, the user devices 3 may beenabled for communicating via more than one type of wireless network(e.g., via a cellular network and a WLAN).

According to the present invention, a DRM server 1 generates the key forthe encryption process within the client site 2 and for the decryptionprocess within the user device 3. More particularly, the approachincludes the following phases. A key generation phase where the DRMserver 1 derives at least one key for protecting the contents, a keytransmission phase where the key is transmitted from the DRM server 1 tothe client site 2, and a content delivery phase, where the client site 2transmits the protected content to a user device 3.

For decrypting the digital content, the user device 3 requests thekey(s) from the DRM server 1, the request may include a keyidentification that was transmitted by the client site 2 to the device 3together with the protected contents and also used by the DRM server 1to derive the key or keys for the device 3.

Advantageously, the key is provided by the DRM server 1 to the clientsite 2 and to the user device 3, and it is not transmitted betweenclient site 2 and user device 3. Moreover, several keys may be generatedin the DRM server 1 and transmitted to the client site 2 to encrypt “onthe fly” corresponding several pieces of digital contents, e.g. the userdevice 3 may request several keys from the DRM server 1, for decryptingpieces of the protected digital content.

The execution of the key generation phase is requested from a DRM batchprotector module 21 of the client site 2, before encrypting the digitalcontents. After receipt of the encryption keys from the DRM server 1,the DRM batch protector module 21 encrypts the digital contents,preferably offline. More particularly, the DRM batch protector module 21reads the digital contents from a local directory or from a URL (UniformResource Locator) and retrieves the encryption keys from a KEY_FILEprovided by the DRM server 1. Preferably, the KEY_FILE is passwordprotected.

The key generation phase may comprise an execution of a SOAP (SimpleObject Access Protocol) API (Application Programming Interface) which isstored inside the DRM server 1, and receives as an in input anidentifier of the digital content to be encrypted, for example the titleof a movie, and a Crypto Period Number (CPN) associated to a number ofsegments or streams in which the digital contents is divided. The outputof the SOAP API is a plurality of encryption keys to be used forencrypting the digital content in a plurality of segments or streams.

The DRM batch protector module 21 transmits the CPN and the identifierof digital contents to the DRM server 1 and receives in response fromthe DRM server 1 the plurality of encryption keys. According to anaspect of the invention, an increased CPN is transmitted from the DRMbatch protector module 21 to the DRM server 1, and further encryptionkeys may be received, to encrypt further segments or streams of data.

In this further request of encryption keys, the content identifier isnot modified. Preferably, the CPN is an unsigned 64-bit integer used forkey scheduling purposes, as different numbers, even with the samecontent identifier, to yield different content encryption keys.

According to a preferred embodiment, the DRM batch protector module 21further transmits the type of DRM Protection System used for encryptingthe digital contents; the type may include, for example, “PlayReady”,“Windows Media DRM” and “Apple HTTP Streaming” as the DRM ProtectionSystem, or any other DRM system using symmetric keys for protection.

Hereafter are given some examples of the output or response from the DRMserver 1 to the client site 2, i.e. to the DRM batch protector module21,in case the DRM Protection System used is “PlayReady”, “Windows MediaDRM” and “Apple HTTP Streaming”.

With PlayReady, the Key provisioning response may include: -a Key IDwhich is a 16-byte array including the identification of the content toPlayReady and to an Entitlement API which is queried by the user device,as is apparent from the description below. The Key ID is also part ofthe PlayReady protected header; -a Seed which is a byte array of atleast 30 bytes including the seed used to generate the content key incombination with the Key ID; -a Content Encryption Key which is a16-byte array used to AES-128 encrypt the contents. The ContentEncryption Key may be deterministically calculated on the basis of KeyID and Seed but, as a preferred embodiment, it is specifically returnedby the SOAP API.

With Windows Media DRM, the Key Provisioning Response may include: a KeyID which is a 16-byte array including the identification of the contentto Windows Media DRM and to the Entitlement API, it is also part of theWMDRM protected header; and a Seed which is a byte array of at least 30bytes including the seed used to generate the content key in combinationwith the Key ID.

With Apple HTTP Streaming, the Key Provisioning Response may include: aKey ID, i.e. a 16-byte array with the identifier of the content to theEntitlement API; and a Content Encryption Key, i.e. a 16-byte arraycomprising the AES key for encrypting the digital content.

Hereafter are examples of steps for transforming the external contentidentifier into Key ID, Seed and/or Content Encryption Key, according toan embodiment of the present invention:

1. A UTF-8 encoding of the content identifier, for example theidentifier “The Family Guy, Season 2, Episode 6”, is given as an inputto a MD5 algorithm.

2. A UTF-8 encoding of a decimal representation of the Crypto number,for example “12345”, is give in input to the same MD5 algorithm.

3. MD5 hash is calculated, returning as an output a 16-byte array whichis the Key ID.

4. The Key ID is given as an input to a key manager table. Atransformation turns any byte array into another 32-byte array by goingthrough SHA-256 and a secret 64 KB “key table”. The keyTable may be a256-by-256 byte square matrix including pseudo-random numbers generatedusing a cryptographically strong random generator. This table isavailable to DRM server 1, for example in a local file. Turning theinitial “contentiD” of arbitrary length into a 32-byte array that can beused as a seed would be appreciated by those skilled in the art.

5. The Key ID and the Seed are given in input to an algorithm having inoutput the Content Encryption Key, preferably 16-bytes long.

As already stated, for PlayReady, at least Key ID and Seed are returned,and as for Windows Media. For Apple HTTP Streaming, Key ID and ContentEncryption Key are returned.

According to the invention, a higher security of the DRM process isobtained avoiding the storage of the keys within the DRM server butderiving the key(s) through an internal server table and with a keyidentification.

Preferably, the transmission of key(s) between the DRM server 1 and theclient site 2 is over a secure channel, more preferably out-of-band.Moreover, the transmission of keys between the DRM server 1 and theclient site 2 is password protected.

In an aspect of the present invention, the transmission of protectedcontents from the client site 2 to the device 1 is streamed, each streambeing separately encrypted before transmission with a differentencryption key generated by the DRM server (e.g. as illustrated in FIG.2).

In another aspect of the invention, the transmission of contents fromthe client site 2 to the device 3 is in a single block, previouslystored in the client site 2. In this case, the digital content isalready available locally in a storage of the client and is notretrieved from a network.

In a preferred embodiment of the invention, the key(s) is used only forone communication session between the DRM server 1 and the client site2, and than marked as consumed or used. This embodiment improvessecurity of the DRM. Also the user device 3 consumes the key(s) afterdecrypting the protected content.

The protected content may be delivered to a content delivery network 4associated to the client site 2, preferably a web server or anedge-caching network, for improving delivery time to the user device 3.

Hereinafter the method will be disclosed in more detail making referenceto the communication flow inside the DRM server 1.

As is known, an Application Programming Interface (API) is a particularset of rules and specifications that a software program can follow toaccess and make use of the services and resources provided by anotherparticular software program that implements that API. In other words, anAPI is an interface between different software programs and facilitatestheir interaction, similar to the way the user interface facilitatesinteraction between humans and computers.

An API can be created for applications, libraries, operating systems,etc., as a way of defining their “vocabularies” and resources requestconventions (e.g. function-calling conventions). It may includespecifications for routines, data structures, object classes, andprotocols used to communicate between the consumer program and theimplementer program of the API.

According to the method the SOAP API, hereafter also referred as KeyProvisioning API, may be used by anyone implementing DRM protection, forexample, by a third-party Media Encoder with all the key material neededto encrypt streaming samples. The delivered key material can inprinciple be used with any DRM technology, but it is especially focusedtowards the following environments including, for example, MicrosoftPlayReady, Apple Streaming and Windows Media DRM 10.1.x.

This new API may provide support for live streaming scenarios, where itis important to be able to switch content encryption keys even withinthe same live stream. To these ends, the concept of “Crypto PeriodNumber” (CPN) is introduced. Encoder vendors can obtain new encryptionkeys for a given stream simply by increasing the CPN, without changingthe main content identifier.

To facilitate the use of this API, the user is allowed to pass in anycontent identifier that makes sense to him such as for instance: “Title,Season 6, Episode 2” (or any string of that kind). The Key ProvisioningAPI will turn these content identifiers into content encryption keysusing a special procedure described below.

After this phase, the Key Provisioning API will return an identifier—forinstance a 16-byte “Key ID”—which can be used later on when requesting alicense from the DRM server 1.

All these procedures may be implemented without needing to store contentIDs, encryption keys, or seeds in any database table. As an example:

Key Provisioning Public Interface involves a service referred to as KeyProvisioning. This service may accept the following parameters in thekey provisioning request: DRM Protection System, e.g. one of“PlayReady”, “Windows Media DRM”, or “Apple HTTP Streaming”; Externalcontent identifier, e.g. any identifier that makes sense to the contentprovider, such as “Title1” or “Title2, Season 4, Episode 1”; CryptoPeriod Number, optional, e.g. an unsigned 64-bit integer that can beused for key scheduling purposes, different numbers, even with the sameexternal content identifier, will yield different content encryptionkeys.

The key provisioning response may be one of three types: PlayReady,Windows Media DRM, or Apple HTTP Streaming. PlayReady Key ProvisioningResponse Key ID, e.g. a 16-byte array containing the key ID thatuniquely identifies the content to PlayReady, and to the Entitlement APIlater on, it also may need to be part of the PlayReady protected header;Seed, e.g. a byte array of at least 30 bytes containing the seed used togenerate the content key (in combination with the Key ID); ContentEncryption Key, e.g. 16-byte array that can be used to AES-128 encryptthe contents, although this may be deterministically calculated on thebasis of Key ID and Seed, it is returned for convenience. Windows MediaDRM Key Provisioning Response: Key ID, e.g. 16-byte array containing thekey ID that uniquely identifies the content to Windows Media DRM, and tothe Entitlement API later on, it may also need to be part of the WMDRMprotected header; Seed, e.g. a byte array of at least 30 bytesrepresenting the seed used to generate the content key (in combinationwith the Key ID). Apple HTTP Streaming Key Provisioning Response: KeyID, e.g. 16-byte array containing the key ID that uniquely identifiesthe content to the Entitlement API later on; Content Encryption Key,e.g. 16-byte array containing the AES key needed to encrypt the content.

A final step may be provided for transforming the arbitrary ExternalContent Identifier into Key ID, Seed, and/or Content Encryption Key.

Hereafter, the phase of requesting the key(s) from the user device tothe DRM server 1 is described in more detail. The request is preferablyserved by another API, also indicated as entitlement or license API,which is stored in the DRM server 1. The entitlement API returns alicense to PlayReady, to WMDRM or an Apple CEK. The API takes in inputthe content identification and, for PlayReady or WMDRM, a test. The APIis programmed to treat different content identification: If a content IDis received, for example xxxx@domain.com, a content metadata (mostnotably, the Seed) is retrieved and passed to an application, e.g.CrossTalk, to generate a license; If a content ID is received in aspecific format, for example cid:#yyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy@domain.com, where it is 32 characterslong and it is the hex-encoding of the Key ID, then the characters areconverted into a 16-byte key ID (and the following step is executed); Ifa 16-byte Key ID is received, the Key ID is given in input to a keymanager table, then the last 2 bytes are discarded, and the output is a30-byte Seed.

Then only one of the following 3 cases may apply: -PlayReady, the Key IDand Seed are given in input to the license server to obtain a license;-Windows Media DRM, the Key ID and Seed are given in input to thelicense server to obtain a license; and -Apple HTTP Streaming, the KeyID and Seed are given in input into an algorithm which turns them into aContent Encryption Key.

As to the client site 2, details of the structure and functioning of theDRM-batch-protector that is preferably an offline content protectiontool will be discussed. The ability to package content offline ispossible by the above disclosed Key Provisioning API that allows togenerate a desired amount of content protection keys in advance.

The DRM-batch-protector 21 may have two modes of operation: KEY_FILE andPROTECT. When working in KEY_FILE mode, the DRM-batch-protector 21 callskey provisioning API of the specified DRM server and retrieves aspecified amount of content encryption keys that are put into a file.Content encryption keys are protected with a password that is alsospecified on the command line. When working in PROTECT mode, theDRM-batch-protector 21 reads content from specified input directory,protects it and writes it to the specified output directory. The keysthat are used for protection are extracted from the key file that hasbeen created in KEY_FILE mode. The PlayReady envelope protection issupported by DRM-batch-protector 21.

According to the present invention a mode referred to as LIVE may beadded to DRM-batch-protector 21. When working in this mode theDRM-batch-protector is able to encrypt content that is being segmentedlive. The DRM-batch-protector is able to read raw content from adirectory or from a URL. When specifying URL—it should be pointing tothe playlist (master). All other DRM-batch-protector properties shouldbe valid. The encryption keys should be taken from the key file.

When working in LIVE mode the DRM-batch-protector 21 may execute thefollowing actions: Download master playlist (if URL specified) or readit from the file system; Read the playlist and extract child playliststhat are specified in the master playlist, or return the master playlistitself; Fork off a thread per each child playlist that would take careof synchronizing raw content with protected one; and DRM-batch-protectorwould keep running until it would receive a Control-C command, then thethreads would shutdown gracefully and DRM-batch-protector would exit.

According to the invention, the DRM-batch-protector may be scheduled toexecute at specified time intervals. For example, the default may be 10s.

While synchronizing the content, DRM-batch-protector 21 may perform thefollowing steps: Read playlist into memory and retrieve all raw contentfiles from it; Check if an encrypted file version already exists in theoutput directory, if not—add it to the new files list; After the checkfor new files is complete, all the old files in the output directorythat do not exist in the playlist will be added to the old files listand would be eventually deleted. The synchronization process may beexecuted by: Deleting old files from the previous run (this is done toprevent files being deleted while some DRM agents might still be usingthem); Encrypting new files; Copying new playlist to the outputdirectory; and Updating old files list so that they would be deleted onthe next run.

The DRM-batch-protector 21 may log errors when they occur and keeprunning.

During protection, from the URL it might happen that a 404 error isreturned from the raw content server while trying to retrieve thecontent file that was specified in the playlist. DRM-batch-protector 21should log such error on DEBUG level and try to sleep for ½ of the timethat a thread sleeps at scheduled interval.

If an error is returned while trying to refresh theplaylist—DRM-batch-protector 21 should retry after a scheduled threadsleep interval, if the same error is returned again, then thread sleepinterval should be increased 2, 3, 4, 5 times each time an error isreturned. Once the thread sleep interval is increased to 5 times itsoriginal time—DRM-batch-protector 21 should continue running until avalid response is received from the server. Once a valid response isreceived—thread scheduled sleep time would return to normal.

A property may be added to DRM-batch-protector 21 that would causeplaylist files to be rewritten in a more friendly format. This could bedone by removing any non-alphabetic and non-numeric characters fromplaylists and content file names and adding proper file extensions.Extensions that should be added to playlist and content files should bespecified as properties and default for instance to .m3u8 for playlistand .ts for content files.

To satisfy requirements of constant availability, DRM-batch-protector 21may be updated with monitoring. This would allow to easily checkDRM-batch-protector status and take any additional measures if needed.SNMP monitoring framework from DRM server can be re-used here.

The present invention also relates to a system for protecting digitalcontents including: a DRM (Digital Right Management) server configuredto derive at least one key; and a client configured to store digitalcontent or receive streaming digital content to be protected, andconfigured to receive a derived key from the DRM server, and configuredto transmit protected digital content to a user device including a keyidentification. The DRM server is configured to receive the keyidentification from the user device to derive the key for the userdevice.

The client site 2 includes a DRM batch protector module 21 configured torequest key generation from the DRM server 1 before encrypting thedigital content to be protected which is then performed offline in theDRM batch protector module after receipt of the derived key from the DRMserver as an encryption key. The DRM batch protector module 21 isconfigured to read the digital content from a local directory or from aURL (Uniform Resource Locator) and retrieve the encryption key from akey file provided to the DRM batch protector module by the DRM serverwith password protection.

The DRM server 1 comprises a SOAP API programmed to receive in inputfrom the DRM batch protector module 21 an identification of the digitalcontent and a number associated to the number of streams or segments inwhich the digital content is to be encrypted and to return in output atleast one code for protecting the digital contents. In one embodiment ofthe invention, the code includes a key ID and a seed. The DRM batchprotector module 21 is programmed to derive the content encryption keyfrom the key ID and the seed. In another embodiment, the SOAP API isprogrammed to directly return the content encryption key the DRM batchprotector module 21.

Preferably, the format of key ID, seed and content encryption key complywith a plurality of DRM protection systems, including for example“PlayReady”, “Windows Media DRM”, “Apple HTTP Streaming”.

Hereafter, the features of an example method and system according to theinvention are briefly summarized. Keys are generated in the DRM Server 1and delivered out-of-band and securely to a client 2, preferably to abatch protector of the client. The number of keys delivered depends onthe encryption job. The key is derived from an internal key table thusthere is no storage of keys per se in the DRM Server. Keys areidentified by key ids and forms the basis of the key derivation functionKey tables can exist on a per client basis, further increasing securityby segregating the key space between clients. The delivered key file isencrypted with a password of choice.

Batch protector is configured with the keys and subsequently started toprotect the content. This content can be a bunch of files stored on diskon the client or retrieved streaming resource and protecting it“on-the-fly”. Keys are consumed as required from the previouslydelivered secure key file. Then, the keys are marked as consumed

The protected content is delivered to the content delivery network ofthe client, for example a simple web server or a edge-caching network.This depends on how quickly the client should deliver the content to theuser devices.

The device downloads the content, detects that it is DRM protected andinitiates license acquisition.

DRM Server receives the license request and generates the encryption keybased on the information received. The key id is used to derive the key.This is shipped as part of the license acquisition protocol. The deviceconsumes the license and can decrypt the content.

Now with reference to FIGS. 3-8, another aspect of the invention will bedescribed.

FIG. 3 schematically represents a user device 100 requesting digitalcontents, a multimedia server 200 or provider server, providing contentsto the user device, and a license server 300 or DRM server, managinglicenses of a DRM scheme.

Referring to FIG. 3, the user device 100 comprises a multimedia player,a DRM Fusion Agent 120, DRM store 130, Proxy server 150 and Local filesystem 140. The Proxy server 150 is stored in the user device, andprovides HTTP streaming service to the multimedia player 110.

The user device 100 comprises a multimedia player 110 or native player,to play the digital contents, the DRM Fusion Agent 120 for downloadingand decrypting the contents, the DRM store 130 for storing encryptionkeys and the Local file system 140. Advantageously, the user device 100further comprises a DRM application, also indicated as Proxy server 150,enabling the multimedia player 110 to play a predetermined HTTPstreaming service provided according to different DRM schemes.

More particularly, the proxy server 150 runs as a local web/streamingserver on the user device 100 and translates static or streamingcontents into a streaming format which is readable from the multimediaplayer 110.

For example, the user device 100 may be an iPhone and the multimediaplayer 110 is the native player of iPhone, i.e. Quick Time Player, whichis used to download and play digital contents according to the AppleHTTP Live Streaming scheme, even if the scope of invention is notlimited thereto.

The proxy server 150 may handle license acquisition, rights managementvia the DRM Fusion Agent 120. According to the invention, the proxyserver 150 translates the HTTP Streaming provided according to other DRMschemes into a format readable to the iPhone native player 110.

The multimedia server 200 may comprise a front-end media server 210 andcontent repository 220 as represented in FIG. 1. The frontend 210receives request for accessing multimedia contents from the user device100 and sends a response after processing. More particularly, thefrontend 210 accesses the content repository 220 and retrieves themultimedia content requested by the user device 100, while themultimedia sever 200 supports several communication protocols such asApple HTTP Live Streaming, Microsoft Smooth Streaming or transmission ofa static file to the user device.

The specific protocol used between the multimedia server 200 and theproxy server 150 is not limited to the examples provided.

FIG. 4 schematically represents a more detailed view of the componentsof the proxy server 150, or DRM application, in the user device 100operating with a multimedia player 110, or native player, andcommunicating with the multimedia server 200 or server provider. Theexample is described when a Smooth Streaming Server (IIS7) is used asmultimedia server 200, and the well known so-called PlayReady standardis used as a DRM standard. The multimedia player 110 of the user device100 supports the HTTP protocol for streaming.

Hereinafter the process steps or phases involved with or following auser's request is discussed. Each step has a corresponding referencenumeral in FIG. 4. Hereinafter, each of the step will be explained indetail.

First, in step 1, the multimedia player 110 receives an instruction of“Play Movie” from GUI. The user is presented with a graphical interfaceallowing him/her to play a movie associated with a certain SmoothStreaming URL. Then, in step 2, a Downloadable Agent API receives theSmooth Streaming URL, and downloads the Smooth Streaming manifest fromthe web server (e.g. IIS 7). In subsequent step 3, the web serverreturns the Smooth Streaming manifest. The Smooth Streaming manifest mayinclude a playlist.

At this point, the API (2) applies some relatively straightforwardtransformations to transform it into an HLS playlist. The conversion maywork as follows:

a. Create a master playlist pointing to bitrate-specific playlists—asmany as there are <QualityLevel> entries for the video stream.

b. For each <QualityLevel> entry, create a bitrate-specific playlist.Each of these playlists will contain a number of TS segments, enoughthat each segment will result to be approximately 10 seconds in lengths.For example, the original Smooth Streaming manifest may contain 20<c>entries representing a Smooth Streaming fragment each. Each of thesesfragments may have a d (duration) attribute of 3 seconds. In that case,the final playlist will have a total of 7 TS segments: 6 of ˜9 seconds,and the last one of ˜6 seconds.

c. Each of the TS segments is actually an (obfuscated) URL pointing tolocalhost (i.e. the device itself) on a randomized port.

Additionally, at this point the Downloadable Agent API starts a localHTTPS listener on the port that was used when creating the HLS playlist.Then, in step 4, the PlayReady License server 300 is called tointervene. If the Smooth Streaming manifest contains the <Protection>element, then the content is DRM-protected. In this case, the APIrequests and receives a license from the license server using thePlayReady content header contained in the manifest. The API sends to thenative player 110 the playlist.

In step 5, the native player 110, for instance using Apple's algorithmsfor bitrate throttling, will pick the most suitable bitrate and attemptto play segments sequentially off of it. By doing so it will hit thelocal web server 150. It should be noted that the native player 110 doesnot need to have a full sense of the actual network conditions, giventhat it will only communicate with the local web server 150 rather thanwith the content server 200 which is on the Internet.

This means that if the native player 110 is using some heuristicalgorithms to try and estimate the available bandwidth, it may not beable to do so unless the local web server 150 somehow mimics theseconditions on the local interface, for instance by throttling the datadelivery rate to match that of the WAN interface. Therefore, accordingto the present invention, this throttling action of the data deliveryrate has an important effect for streaming protocols such as HLS becausethey use just these algorithms to decide what stream to play.

Then, in step 6, the local HTTPS server 150 may receive from the nativeplayer a request of three possible types:

a. Master playlist request. In this case, the local server will serve upthe master HLS playlist that was computed at the beginning.

b. Bitrate-specific playlist request. In this case, the local serverwill serve up the requested bitrate-specific HLS playlist that wascomputed at the beginning.

c. A single TS segment. In this case, the local web server will assemblea TS segment as described in steps 7 through 11 below.

The incoming local HTTPS request contains the start timestamp of theSmooth Streaming fragment the user wants to retrieve, step 7. The APIthen uses a set of algorithms to determine the following:

a. How many Smooth Streaming fragments are needed in order to total 10seconds,

b. The start timestamp of the corresponding audio fragment, and

c. How many audio fragments are needed.

At this point, the HTTP client will perform a number of parallel HTTPGET requests to the Smooth Streaming server to retrieve all these videoand audio Smooth Streaming fragments. After that, step 8, the web serverreturns all the requested Smooth Streaming fragments, which at thispoint are still PlayReady DRM-encrypted.

If the downloaded fragments are encrypted, then in step 9 the DRM Agent120 will decrypt them in-memory 130 using the license previouslyacquired. A further step 10 is provided wherein the Smooth Streamingfragments are then parsed to extract the raw H.264 streams and the rawAAC streams. All raw H.264 streams are then concatenated together toreach a length of about 10 seconds, and the same goes for all raw AACstreams.

In step 11 the MPEG 2 Transport Stream multiplexer component takes theconcatenated H.264 stream and the concatenated AAC stream andmultiplexes them together, taking care that the timestamps are in sync.It thus generates an MPEG 2 Transport Stream segment. The segment isreturned to the local HTTPS server 150 in a step numbered 12. The HTTPSserver 150 fulfils the local request by returning the multiplexed TSsegment in step 13, which the native player 110 plays in the correctsequence order.

Therefore, the above described approach allows a content encoded withMicrosoft Smooth Streaming and encrypted with Microsoft PlayReady DRM toreach iOS devices and to be displayed smoothly, while retaining theadaptive streaming capabilities of the Smooth Streaming protocol.

Moreover, the approach renders possible to keep simultaneously thiscontent DRM-protected as long as possible to avoid snooping,interception, and capture. In other words, the approach allows theimplementation of the DRM-protected Smooth Streaming library for aDownloadable Agent with Native Player on a iOS environment.

With reference to FIG. 5, it is schematically represented the method forplaying digital contents according to the invention, wherein, in thisexample, the DRM proxy of an iPhone communicates with a correspondingQuick time Player and with a HTTP streaming remote media server viaApple HTTP Streaming. The user device 30 selects digital content from alist of contents in the GUI (Graphic User Interface); from the userpoint of view, the application simply opens the native player, Quicktime Player, which starts playing the contents after a short delay.

However, hidden to the user, the following steps may be executed: TheDRM proxy displays a GUI with a list of contents; the list is retrievedfrom a website or is hard-coded in the application; The user selects adesired content, and preferably, there is a one-to-one correspondencebetween contents and playlist, therefore the DRM proxy may detect whichplaylist to retrieve from the server for a content requested from theuser; The DRM proxy retrieves the original playlist, for exampleHarryPotter.m3u which comprises, for example, the following packets:“http://mediaserver/packet1.ts”, “http://mediaserver/packet2.ts”, . . .. The DRM proxy transforms the playlist in a local playlist (In anaspect of the present invention, the transformed playlist, for exampleHarryPotter-local.m3u, replaces the real hostname/port with the localhostname/port, as “http://localhost:9999/packet1.ts”,“http://localhost:9999/packet2.ts”, . . . . The DRM proxy passes thetransformed playlist to native player, for example Quick Time player;The native player, which is enabled to read the M3U format, requests thefirst file from the local playlist, i.e.http://localhost:9999/packet1.ts; The DRM proxy applies a reversetransformation on the host name, and requestshttp://mediaserver/packet1.ts from the media server; Media servertransmits the corresponding packet, packet1.ts, more particularly,packet1.ts is PlayReady envelope-encrypted; The DRM proxy, calls a DRMAgent in a DRM server, checks if it has a license for packet1.ts, and ifthe license is not detected the DRM Proxy, calls the DRM Agent andnavigates to the silent License Acquisition URL which is included in anencrypted content's header, for examplehttp://drmserver/licenseacq.asmx, and in this respect, according to anaspect of the present invention, all the packets packet1.ts, packet2.ts,have the same content Identification DRM-wise (which is for example thesame for the whole movie) and therefore share the samelicense/decryption key (in this respect, in a different embodiment ofthe invention, the license acquisition is started before starting thenative player with the playlist; this is advantageous because, if nolicense may be obtained, it is not necessary to start the nativeplayer); The DRM server returns silently a valid license; The DRM Proxy,calls DRM Fusion Agent and decrypts packet1.ts in memory; and the DRMProxy returns the decrypted packed to the native player, which displaysthe video packet to the user.

According to another embodiment of the invention, the DRM Proxy does notdecrypt but it leaves each packet encrypted. It inserts an EXT-X-KEYitem at the top of the playlist, using a same AES-128 key used in thePlayReady encryption, for example. The DRM Proxy, instead of decryptingthe packet, will only proceed to remove the PlayReady envelope header,leaving only the raw AES128-encrypted data. The DRM Proxy then pass thisraw data back to Native Player. The Native Player, with EXT-X-KEY,obtains the decryption key and decrypts the packet itself.

The native player requests the second playlist item,http://localhost:9999/packet2.ts. The DRM proxy calls the DRM Agent andchecks if it has a license for packet2.ts. in the example given above,i.e. all the packets have the same decryption key, the license key isavailable. The DRM proxy calls the DRM Agent, decrypts packet2.ts inmemory.

The DRM proxy returns decrypted packet2 to Native Player, which displaysthe video packet to the user. These last four steps are repeated for allthe video reproduction.

With reference to FIG. 6, it is schematically represented the method forplaying digital contents according to another aspect of the invention.In this case, the DRM proxy of an iPhone communicates with acorresponding Quick time Player to play a static file. Moreparticularly, the following steps are executed: The DRM Proxy shows theGUI with a list of contents. This list can be retrieved from a websiteor hard-coded in the application; The User selects the desired content;The DRM Proxy retrieves the full PlayReady-envelope encrypted fileHarryPotter-encrypted.mp4; The DRM Proxy creates a new local playlistwithout yet decrypting the file, the new playlist, for exampleHarryPotter-local.m3u, is in the form:“http://localhost:9999/packet1.ts”, “http://localhost:9999/packet2.ts”,“http://localhost:9999/packetN.ts”, in this step, the DRM Proxy usesheuristics to determine a number of packets (“N”) to be used, based onthe content length, this is because it is memory-consuming to decryptthe whole movie in memory beforehand; The DRM Proxy passes thetransformed playlist to the native player; The native player, detectingthe M3U format, requests the first file from its playlist,http://localhost:9999/packet1.ts; The DRM Proxy checks whether a licenseis available for the whole movie file, and if the license is notdetected, the DRM Proxy calls the DRM Agent, navigates to the silentLicense Acquisition URL contained in the encrypted content's header, forexample http://drmserver/licenseacq.asmx (also in this example, it isassumed that there is only one DRM content ID (for example, the same forthe whole movie) and therefore all packets share the samelicense/decryption key), as already stated above, according to adifferent embodiment, the license acquisition is started before invokingthe native player; The DRM Server returns silently a valid license; TheDRM Proxy calls the DRM Agent, decrypts in memory 1/Nth of the movieplus enough data to reach the next MPEG 2 boundary, this is thedecrypted packet1, and in this respect, in order to comply with the HTTPStreaming specification, each packet is terminated on an MPEG 2boundary, with some additional restrictions; The DRM Proxy returnsdecrypted packet1 to Native Player, which display the video packet tothe user.

Also in this case, according to another embodiment of the invention, theDRM Proxy does not decrypt at all but it leaves the whole movieencrypted. It inserts an EXT-X-KEY item at the top of the playlist,using the same AES-128 key that was used in the PlayReady encryption.The DRM Proxy, instead of decrypting the movie, proceeds to remove thePlayReady envelope header, leaving only the raw AES128-encrypted data,and then simply cut off a still-encrypted packet of (movielength)/(number of packets) length. DRM Proxy then passes this raw databack to Native Player. The Native Player, with EXT-X-KEY, obtains thedecryption key and decrypts the packet itself.

The Native player requests the second playlist item,http://localhost:9999/packet2.ts. The DRM Proxy, calls the DRM Agent,checks if it has a license for the whole movie file. If all the packetshave the same decryption key, the license is available. The DRM Proxycalls the DRM Agent, decrypts in memory the next 1/Nth of the movie plusenough data to reach the next MPEG 2 boundary, i.e. the packet2decrypted. The DRM Proxy returns packet2-decrypted to Native Player,which displays the video packet to the user. The last four steps arerepeated for displaying all the digital content.

With reference to FIG. 7, it is schematically represented the method forplaying digital contents according to another aspect of the invention.In this case, the DRM proxy of an iPhone communicates with acorresponding Quick time Player and with a Microsoft Smooth Streamingfrom a remote server to play the digital content. More particularly, thefollowing steps are executed: The DRM Proxy shows a GUI with a list ofcontents, this list can be retrieved from a website or hard-coded in theapplication; The User selects a desired content; Preferably, there is aone to one mapping between contents and playlist so that DRM Proxydetects the playlist to be retrieve from the server; The DRM Proxyretrieves the original SmoothStreaming playlist and Manifest files.

The DRM Proxy transforms the playlist in a local playlist, thetransformed playlist (HarryPotter-local.m3u) has the same number ofpackets as the original manifest but points to “files” on the local DRMproxy: “http://localhost:9999/packet1.ts”,“http://localhost:9999/packet2.ts”, . . . . The DRM Proxy passes thetransformed playlist to the native player, the playlist name is notexpected to show anywhere in the UI; The Native player, whichunderstands the M3U format, requests the first file from its playlist,http://localhost:9999/packet1.ts.

The DRM Proxy selects a suitable bitrate among the ones offered in theserver playlist. In this respect, according to a first aspect of theinvention, the bitrate is constant. The DRM Proxy transforms theplaylist entry into an HTTP GET request compliant with theSmoothStreaming URL format(http://mediaserver/QualityLevels(chosenBitrate)/Fragments(video=startTime001),and sends the request to the media server. The Media server serves videopacket starting at startTime001. The packet is PlayReadyenvelope-encrypted. The DRM Proxy calls the DRM Agent, checks if it hasa license for the whole movie.

If a license is not available, the DRM Proxy calls the DRM Fusion Agent,navigates to the silent License Acquisition URL contained in theencrypted packet's PlayReady header, for examplehttp://drmserver/licenseacq.asmx. Also in this case, it is assumed thatall packets have the same content ID DRM-wise; license acquisition mightbe started before invoking the native player with the playlist. The DRMServer returns silently a valid license. The DRM Proxy calls a DRMAgent, decrypts the video packet into decrypted packet1 in memory. Inthis respect, if the codecs supported by SmoothStreaming are also notvalid codecs for HTTP Streaming, an additional decoding/re-encoding stepis necessary at this stage. The DRM Proxy returns decrypted packet1 toNative Player, which displays the video packet to the user.

In a different embodiment of the invention, the DRM Proxy does notdecrypt at all but it leaves each packet encrypted. It inserts anEXT-X-KEY item at the top of the playlist, using the same AES-128 keyused in the PlayReady encryption. The DRM Proxy, instead of decryptingthe packet, proceeds to remove the PlayReady envelope header, leavingonly the raw AES128-encrypted data. The DRM Proxy then passes the rawdata back to Native Player. The Native Player, with EXT-X-KEY, obtains adecryption key and decrypts the packet itself.

The Native player requests the second playlist item,http://localhost:9999/packet2.ts. The DRM Proxy calls the DRM FusionAgent, checks if it has a license for the whole movie. Also in thiscase, this is assumed to be true. The DRM Proxy calls the DRM FusionAgent, decrypts the video packet in memory. The DRM Proxy returnspacket2-decrypted to the Native Player, which displays the video packetto the user. The last four steps 16-19 are repeated for all the digitalcontent execution.

To implement the method of the invention, there is provided an agentwhich is downloadable into the user device and acts as the DRMapplication to play digital contents protected by several DRM scheme.The Agent is integrated with the user device platform's native mediaplayer. This is advantageous with respect to using a 3rd party player,since the user device hardware acceleration may be used to decode andrender video, making the playback smoother and allowing for higherquality content.

Moreover, using the native player to play DRM protected content, asimpler user interface, integrated with the other application of theuser device may be provided. The Agent supports streaming content viathe HTTP Live Streaming protocol, and support for other streamingprotocols such as Microsoft's Smooth Streaming and for contentdownloaded to the device. FIG. 8 schematically represents theintegration of the user device application and the Agent and thecommunication with external devices.

The Agent is integrated with an application created by the customer andit is hidden to the user, since it has no UI element on screen.Preferably, the Agent manages the customer application and/or the nativeplayer with a public API. The Agent's API includes a set of methods orinstructions which enables the customer application or the native playerto acquire licenses for protected content and prepare the native playerto play it. This API is provided as a static linked library written inObjective C. A Media Player Framework included in the iOS SDK (Softwaredevelopment kit) enables the application to customize some features ofthe native player, for example the size and position of video renderingview or the playback controls. Only when used in conjunction with theAgent, it can be used to play content protected with PlayReady DRM.

According to the invention, a user device for playing digital contentsprotected by a DRM scheme and stored in a server provider is alsoprovided. The user device comprises a DRM application interfacing theserver and a native player of the user device, the DRM application beingconfigured for:

-   -   selecting a digital content to be downloaded and retrieving a        corresponding remote playlist;    -   transforming the remote playlist in a local playlist having a        format readable from the native player and associated to a        plurality of local packets of the digital contents to be played        in the native player and, for each local packet:    -   requesting a corresponding remote packet to the server;    -   acquiring a license to decrypt the remote packet;    -   decrypting the remote packet and returning the decrypted packet        to the native player as the local packet to be played.

The DRM application is configured to connect a DRM server for acquiringthe license and to send an URL included in the digital contents forretrieving the license. It is also configured to acquire the licensebefore activating the native player and to activate the native playeronly if the license is acquired. More particularly, the DRM applicationis configured to acquire one license available to decrypt all the remotepackets of the remote playlist, the license being preferably associatedto the first remote packet of the remote playlist. The remote playlistretrieved from the DRM application may include only one remote packetcorresponding to the entire digital content and the DRM application isconfigured to divide the remote packet in the plurality of local packetsto be displayed in the native player.

According to an aspect of the invention, the DRM application isconfigured for retrieving a SmoothStreaming playlist and Manifest filesand selecting a bit rate among the bit rates available in the remoteplaylist. Moreover, the native player is configured to request an HTTPconnection for receiving the digital content and the DRM application isconfigured to secure a communication between the native player and theserver provider and for:

-   -   receiving a request to access the content of the server provider        from the native player with a first URL associated with the        content, the first URL not including an effective URL which        provides direct streaming from the server provider for said        content;    -   sending a request for receiving the remote playlist associated        with the content to the server provider, based on the request        from the native player;    -   receiving the remote playlist from the server provider,        including at least one bit-rate information for the content;    -   generating the local playlist based on the remote playlist, the        local playlist including at least one bit-rate information, a        corresponding URL and corresponding port number, wherein the        corresponding URL includes the user device and the corresponding        port number is generated randomly;    -   requesting a license associated with the content to the DRM        server if the content is protected by DRM;    -   sending the local playlist to the native player;    -   receiving an HTTP request associated with the content from the        native player through a port which is determined based on a        bit-rate of the local playlist selected by the native player;    -   requesting a streaming for the content having said bit-rate        selected to the server provider;    -   receiving said packets associated with the digital content from        the server provider;    -   decrypting the packets with said license if the plurality of        packets is protected by DRM; and    -   sending a HTTP response corresponding to the HTTP request to the        native player, the HTTP connection response including the        decrypted content.

The DRM application is further configured for parsing the packets andstoring temporarily the parsed packed into an audio stream buffer andvideo stream buffer separately, after receiving the packets; and muxingthe parsed audio stream and the parsed video stream with a syncinformation into a segment, the HTTP connection response including thesegment to be played by the multimedia player. The parsed video streamis H.264 stream, the parsed audio stream is AAC stream, and the muxingis performed by MPEG2 Transport Stream muxer.

According to an embodiment, the first URL is smooth streaming URL, theremote playlist is a smooth streaming manifest, and the local playlistis HLS playlist. The streaming for the multimedia content to the contentserver is performed through HTTP protocol using a number of parallelHTTP GET request.

Advantageously, according to the present invention, the native player ofthe user device is used to play the content even if the DRM schemerequires a different and specific player. Advantageously, thecommunication between the native player and the operating system of theuser device is faster than a communication between such operating systemand a specific and non-native player. In fact, the native player may usethe accelerator provided by the operating system of the user device forrendering the digital contents. Advantageously, the download of a thirdparty player in the user device is avoided.

Another aspect of the invention will now be discussed with reference toFIGS. 9 and 10.

Referring now to FIG. 9, an exemplary communication flow between userdevice 100 and multimedia server 200 will be discussed.

The user device 100 comprises a multimedia player 110 and a proxy server150. The multimedia player 110 communicates with the proxy server 150 toreceive multimedia content from the multimedia server 200.

The proxy server 150 is installed in the user device 100. The proxyserver 150 may be implemented as a separate hardware, or may be anapplication program which runs in the user device 110. If the proxyserver is implemented as an application, it can be a standaloneapplication or can be provided as a module being used by anotherprogram.

The proxy server 150 may communicate with the multimedia server 200through cellular network, wireless LAN or wire communication protocol.Specific protocol used for the communication between proxy server 150and Multimedia server 200 does not limit the scope of invention, andprovided here as an example. Generally, since the user device 100 andthe multimedia server 200 are located distantly, it takes time for thepacket to be communicated between the user device 100 and the multimediaserver 200. That is to say, when the proxy server send a data packet 250which may include a request of e.g. playlist or actual multimedia datato the multimedia server 200, there exists a delay for the data packet250 to reach the multimedia server 200. Moreover, when a data packet 240which may include a playlist or a segment of the actual multimedia datapass through the network, it also needs time to arrive at the proxyserver 150. These times for the data packets 250 and 240 to be passthrough the network may vary depending on the status of network, thusinfluencing the data rate of the packets 250 and 240.

Meanwhile, for the communication between the multimedia player 110 andthe proxy server 150, there may be also some delays. However, since bothof the multimedia player 110 and the proxy server 150 are running in theuser device 100, the delay for communicating the packets 115 and 125 isvery low compared to that of the packets 250 and 240. That is to say,the data rate of packet 115 and packet 125 is far higher than that ofthe packet 250 and packet 240.

In some cases, the proxy server 150 may send the data 125 to themultimedia player as soon as it receives data packet 240 from themultimedia server 200. That is, the proxy server 150 may merely redirectthe packet received to the multimedia player 110.

However, in another example, the proxy server 150 may buffer datareceived from the multimedia server 200. Then, if a sufficient amount ofdata is buffered, the proxy server 150 may start to send its data to themultimedia player 110. Periodically, the proxy server 150 may check thestatus of the buffer, and if there is not enough data for sending to themultimedia player 110, it can suspend sending, and wait for the bufferto be filled again.

In any of the above examples, the multimedia player 110 is not aware ofhow the proxy server 150 and the multimedia server 200 work exactlyunless there is a protocol to notify it between the multimedia player110 and the proxy server 150.

For example, it may be supposed that the multimedia player 110 uses amultimedia streaming protocol established based on HTTP, and the proxyserver 150 acts as an HTTP server. If the multimedia player 110 isprogrammed not to distinguish where the server it connects is located,it will function in the same way regardless of whether the server islocated in the local device or not.

Sometimes, the multimedia player 110 may use heuristic algorithms to tryand estimate the available bandwidth based on the data it receives. Inthis case, the multimedia player 110 analyzes the packet 125 andestimates the data rate of it. If the proxy server 150 sends data asmuch as possible to multimedia player 110 whenever the multimedia player110 requests it, the multimedia player 110 could estimate the data rateincorrectly, e.g. higher that its actual data rate, because there can bea data burst during a short period. It is highly possible that themultimedia player estimate a higher data rate than the real data ratebetween the proxy server 150 and the multimedia server 200.

It may be pointed out that a goal here is to mimic the networkconditions, e.g. from a WAN interface into the local interface, so thatthe proxy server can work in a transparent way for the multimedia player110, i.e. not affecting the player's heuristics to estimate theavailable bandwidth.

According to the approach, and solving such a problem, the proxy server150 estimates the data rate between the user device 300 and themultimedia server 200 and sends a data stream for the multimedia contentto the multimedia player 200 based on the estimated data rate. There mayexist various ways to estimate the data rate between the user device 100and the multimedia player 200. If the network driver software of theuser device 100 provides an average data rate through an API, the proxyserver 150 may call the API to retrieve the actual network speed betweenthe proxy server 150 and the multimedia server 200.

In another alternative embodiment, the proxy server 150 may measure datarates for a plurality of multimedia contents based on the plurality ofpacket 240 for the multimedia content which is received. For example, ifthe proxy server 150 may count the amount of data received during aspecific interval, the amount and the interval may be considered tocalculate the approximate data rate. The measurement for the data ratemay even be performed periodically.

Once, the approximate data rate is calculated, the proxy server 150 maycontrol its data rate of the data packets 125 between the multimediaplayer 110 and the proxy server 150. For example, it can reply for therequest 115 from the multimedia player 110 not as soon as possible butafter waiting for a duration of time to make the multimedia player 110believe that it is communicating with a remote server. The duration oftime to wait for can be determined based on the approximate data ratebetween the proxy server 150 and the multimedia server 200.Alternatively, the proxy server 150 may stream data 125 to themultimedia player 110 based on the approximate data rate.

How the system of the present invention takes care of the security ofthe downloadable DRM agent will now be discussed. Secret keys andlicenses are stored in an HDS (PlayReady database). It stores allpersistent information related to DRM licenses, including license keys(secrets). The database encrypts all keys stored in the HDS using keysderived from the unique device private key. The unique device privatekey (and certificate) is created at the run time the very first time theDRM Fusion Agent is initialized, that is to say the first time theapplication is run after installation. To create the device key and thecertificate a model key (or application key) is used in the followingprocedure:

-   -   for downloadable application, the unique model key should be        part of the application image;    -   the generated device key is stored as an encrypted file        (encrypted by a key derived from the model key).

To summarize, the root of the trust key is the application or modelprivate key. This is stored in the application image in encryptedformat.

It must be noted that the DRM Fusion Agent protects the device key byusing SW obfuscation technologies.

The model key is used to create a device unique key the first time theapplication is initialized. The device key or the certificate is usedfor authenticating to PlayReady servers during license acquisition. Alllicenses received from the server contain keys that are wrapped withother keys derived from the device unique key. Run time protection ofkeys is provided by anti-debugging, obfuscation.

In this respect it is also important providing a secure clockImplementation and this is obtained through:

-   -   a rollback detection of the system clock;    -   a synchronizing system time, with a secure network time server        (e.g. provided by Microsoft), which is invoked if a user        modification of a system clock is detected.

The DRM Core software library including all sensitive DRM relatedfunctions and parameters are protected by obfuscation and anti-tamperingtechnologies.

In FIG. 10 it is presented a schematic view of the integration with iOSnative player including the security measures within the iOS nativeplayer. As to the media content Server 200, it should be noted that itsmain duties are the following: reformats the PlayReady protected mediainto a native player compatible HLS local stream; but decrypted datanever stored on flash, and no decoding/re-encoding is applied; The mediacontent server is started on demand only when media is ready to bedisplayed; Internal address invisible to external parties or otherinstalled applications; Random listen port and media URLs are used oneach playback session; HTTP authentication applied between Media ContentServer and Native Player; Generated credentials are passed from the DRMFusion Agent when launching the native media player; SSL encryptionapplied between Media Content Server and Native Player; The local mediastream is encrypted with SSL by the media content server and decryptedby the native media player.

The SW Obfuscation, anti-debugging and anti-tampering procedure areapplied by default to protect the DRM Fusion Agent software.

Many modifications and other embodiments of the invention will come tothe mind of one skilled in the art having the benefit of the teachingspresented in the foregoing descriptions and the associated drawings.Therefore, it is to be understood that the invention is not to belimited to the specific embodiments disclosed, and that modificationsand embodiments are intended to be included within the scope of theappended claims.

1-24. (canceled)
 25. A method for playing digital contents protected bya Digital Rights Management (DRM) scheme, the protected digital contentsbeing downloaded by a user device from a media server in the form ofprotected segments, the method comprising: executing a DRM proxy insidethe user device, the DRM proxy interfacing the media server and aplayer, the player being configured to implement the HTTP Live Streamingprotocol (HLS); executing an HLS server in the DRM proxy; registeringthe DRM proxy to handle HTTP requests received by the user device;producing by the DRM proxy a playlist in HLS format including a list ofUniform Resource Locators (URLs) locating the individual protectedsegments, the segment URLs being formatted with a host name or IPaddress assigned to the user device; processing the playlist in theplayer, whereby the player successively issues a request for each URL inthe playlist, and each URL is directed to the HLS server of the DRMproxy; in the DRM proxy, acquiring a license to access the protectedsegment identified by a current URL request; decrypting the protectedsegment in the DRM proxy based on the license; and returning a segmentbased on the decrypted segment to the player in response to the currentURL request.
 26. The method according to claim 25, wherein the DRM proxyand the player are configured to connect using the HTTPS protocol andthe URLs of the playlist are formatted with the HTTPS protocol, wherebythe DRM proxy returns the segments to the player through an encryptedchannel.
 27. The method according to claim 25, comprising: connectingthe DRM proxy to the media server, selecting a digital content to bedownloaded and retrieving a corresponding remote playlist; transformingthe remote playlist into said playlist in HLS format; and requesting,from the DRM proxy to the media server, a remote segment correspondingto the segment identified in the current URL request, and receiving theremote segment with the DRM proxy as the protected segment to decrypt.28. A non-transitory computer readable storage medium storinginstructions which, when executed on a processor, perform stepscomprising: executing a Digital Rights Management (DRM) proxy inside auser device, the DRM proxy interfacing a media server and a player, theplayer being configured to implement the HTTP Live Streaming protocol(HLS); executing an HLS server in the DRM proxy; registering the DRMproxy to handle HTTP requests received by the user device; producing bythe DRM proxy a playlist in HLS format including a list of UniformResource Locators (URLs) locating the individual protected segments, thesegment URLs being formatted with a host name or IP address assigned tothe user device; processing the playlist in the player, whereby theplayer successively issues a request for each URL in the playlist, andeach URL is directed to the HLS server of the DRM proxy; in the DRMproxy, acquiring a license to access the protected segment identified bya current URL request; decrypting the protected segment in the DRM proxybased on the license; and returning a segment based on the decryptedsegment to the player in response to the current URL request.
 29. A userdevice for playing digital contents protected by a Digital RightsManagement (DRM) scheme and downloaded from a media server in a form ofprotected segments, comprising: a network connection to a playerconfigured to implement the HTTP Live Streaming protocol (HLS); and aDRM proxy interfacing the media server and the network connection, theDRM proxy configured to run an HLS server, register itself to handleHTTP requests received by the user device, produce a playlist in an HTTPLive Streaming protocol (HLS) format including a list of UniformResource Locators (URLs) locating the individual protected segments, thesegment URLs being formatted with a host name or IP address assigned tothe user device, send the playlist to the player through the networkconnection, receive a URL request from the player on the networkconnection, acquire a license to access the protected segment identifiedby the URL request, decrypt the protected segment based on the license,and return a segment based on the decrypted segment to the player. 30.The user device according to claim 29, wherein said DRM proxy and theplayer are configured to connect using the HTTPS protocol and the URLsof the playlist are formatted with the HTTPS protocol, whereby the DRMproxy returns the protected segments to the player through an encryptedchannel.